Zimbabwe murders alarming

MURDER and escalating violence in Zimbabwe is alarming, the International Bar Association’s Human Rights Institute (IBAHRI) said on 11 June.

The violence in the run-up to Zimbabwe’s presidential run-off elections, which were due on 27 June, had included more than 40 murders as well as assassination threats against prominent human rights lawyers, the IBAHRI said.

Threats on the life of one human rights lawyer, Andrew Makoni, have resulted in him fleeing the country for neighbouring South Africa.

Andrew Makoni has relayed to the IBA conversations he has had with credible sources that contend there is a plan in place to assassinate him or another high-profile human rights lawyer, consequently conveying an unmistakeable message to other human rights lawyers defending political activists.

"It is a matter of record that, in recent weeks, four of Mr Makoni’s clients have been brutally murdered without anyone being held accountable," the media release said.

"Especially having regard to the need for a free and fair run-off election, it is quite unacceptable that human rights lawyers in Zimbabwe are consistently under attack for carrying out the duties of their profession," says Justice Richard Goldstone, co-chair of the IBAHRI and former Judge of the Constitutional Court of South Africa.

"I call on President Mugabe and his government to do all within their power to prevent attacks on human rights lawyers and their clients."

As a member state of the United Nations, Zimbabwe, under paragraphs 16 and 17 of the United Nations Basic Principles on the Role of Lawyers (adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1990), is obligated to "ensure that lawyers are able to perform all of their professional functions without intimidation, hindrance, harassment or improper interference."

"There should be an immediate investigation into the brutal and untimely deaths of all of the 40-plus murdered political activists since the March elections," IBAHRI co-chair Emilio Cárdenas says.